The general field of the invention relates to a gas oven having a broil burner.
It is common for a gas oven to have two burners. The bake burner, which has commonly been referred to as the oven burner, it typically housed in a burner box or combustion chamber located below the floor of the oven cavity. Products of combustion from the bake burner either flow directly into the oven cavity or are used to heat a baffle which provides heat to the cavity.
In the prior art, broil burners have been located within the oven cavity adjacent to the ceiling. One type of broil burner is a radiant burner such as described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,122,197, issued Feb. 25, 1964. In such a radiant burner, a gaseous fuel issues from a bottom porous surface such as a screen. The flames burn close to the screen heating it to an incandescent temperature to provide infrared radiant energy which is directed downwardly to broil food. In another type of broil burner, the bottom structure is such that the gaseous fuel issuing from ports is dispersed laterally causing a relatively wide horizontally burning flame. With either type of broil burner, however, an oven liner front wall which extends downwardly at the entrance to the cavity has been used. The function of the oven liner front wall is to provide a shield for the broil burner. If cooking utensils or food were pushed against the broil burner they could damage the burner, clog ports, or seriously interfere with the flow of the gaseous fuel and/or secondary combustion air to and around the burner. A drawback of the conventional oven liner front wall is that it significantly reduces the usable volume of the oven cavity by lowering the entrance height. This has resulted in a competitive disadvantage for gas ovens as compared to electric ovens. More specifically, a customer who wants a self-clean oven with a cavity broiler is often influenced to buy an electric oven because an equivalent gas oven has had significantly smaller usable volume.